Clone of Water Issue

The City of Montgomery recently notified by mail, all customers of our water system, about elevated levels of certain chemicals called TTHMs (Trihalomethanes) found in our drinking water.  The City of Montgomery received a Notice of Violation from TDEQ citing TTHM levels exceeding the standard.  The Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) for TTHMs based on the Local Running Annual Average (LRAA) is 0.080 mg/L or 80 parts per billion. The compliance value determined by the LRAA after quarterly testing in April was 0.082 mg/L or 82 parts per billion. Levels are tested by the Texas Department of Environmental Quality every quarter and if the average of those four tests come back higher than the adopted standard, TDEQ issues the water operator a Notice of Violation with steps to remedy and bring back into compliance.   Part of that compliance is notifying customers of those higher levels and how we will be bringing those levels back into compliance.   

Definition of Total Trihalomethanes (TTHM)

Trihalomethanes are a group of chemicals that can form when organic matter in water is treated with halogen disinfectants such as chlorine. The most common of these chemicals is trichloromethane, but others, such as dibromochloromethane, bromodichloromethane, or bromoform can also be found. The sum of these four chemicals is referred to as total trihalomethanes (TTHMs).

Moving Forward

The City of Montgomery has already flushed the system and taking the following steps to rectify the situation:

• 3rd Party Lab Testing of entire system every two weeks (we will post results on this website in the file section below)
  • While the state pulls test samples at two sites each quarter, we are testing six sites, including the water well
• Intermittent flushing and testing pre and post flush 
• Lowered the amount of chlorine
• Testing the switching of wells based on heat index
• Looking for advanced expertise to operate our water system

Additional information about water systems and testing is available by clicking here from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.